KLA

Overview

KLA is a global supplier of process control, defect inspection and metrology equipment used by semiconductor and electronics manufacturers. The company is headquartered in Milpitas, California, and listed on Nasdaq under the ticker KLAC. Its Belgian footprint dates to 2008, when KLA-Tencor acquired Icos Vision Systems, a Leuven-area company founded in 1982 as a spin-off from KU Leuven that designed inspection systems for semiconductor packaging and interconnect applications.

The Leuven site is now the main location for KLA's ICOS division, which builds component inspection, die sorting and packaging-inspection tools used by chipmakers worldwide. According to KLA, around 115 software, applications, mechanical, electrical, design and algorithm engineers are based at the Leuven facility, working with the global ICOS organisation on R&D, manufacturing and customer support. The division operates R&D centres in Belgium, Germany and Hong Kong, and production sites in Belgium, Hong Kong and China.

Inside the Flanders Semiconductors & Photonics cluster, KLA's Leuven operation sits in the orbit of imec and the wider KU Leuven research network, supplying inspection technology for the back-end packaging steps that have become a focus of advanced-node chip manufacturing.